Quote:
Originally Posted by bkahl
Then why not give students more time around said STEM experiences by not making them put their creation in a trash bag?
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This is one of my least favorite things from being a student to a mentor. As a student it's annoying to have the reason you want to be there cut off for no apparent reason. It is less fun and it never did anything for me. As a mentor it sucks that all this extra time I could spend doing more hands on teaching work is wasted right when the students are most engaged with the program.
The most effective time to teach is when we are building the robot. The most effective teaching tool I have gets locked when it is most effective.
Also since it's very contested...
The mentor burnout thing makes no sense to me in the context of pro vs anti bag.
Why not meet less often?
My anecdote:
We have 7 people who regularly help us with technical roles. 5 full time workers, one collage student (me), one retiree. None of us get burnt out because we spent X total hours working. We get bunt out if we spend long hours day after day taking up most of a week and don't get time for other things during said time frame. I could work on robots twice a week for months and never burn out but 5 to 6 days a week for two weeks is really hard.
The only thing we actually need is consistent commitment from key mentors. The bag day is what forces that to be 2-4 days a week then 5-6 when something inevitably goes wrong in the late game. Why can't we just spread out our work the way that works best for our team? Why can't you just set
your own schedule, stick to it so you don't burn out, and
let us do what makes us more sustainable?
Stuffing all the work in to a shorter time frame is worse for burnout and hurts our team.
EDIT:
Quote:
Originally Posted by bkahl
I understand your issue.
However, upon a bit more investigation I think ending SBD will actually help students to NOT burn out.
Here's why:
Lets say a students spends 5hrs/day 5 days/wk at build, that's fairly common among teams from my understanding. That would equate to 25 hours a week, and over the 6 week build season (although that in itself is a myth), would mean the student spent 150 hours of their time at robotics.
Now, lets get rid of stop build day.
The build season now becomes longer, and the robot doesn't have to be done in 6 weeks. This opens students up to not having to cram hours in during the 6 week period.
Let's decide to enter a week 2 competition. Now we have 9 weeks to prepare a robot, instead of 6.
Let's also cut down hours/day to 3.5, giving students more time to focus on homework, or other activities they may want to participate in.
3.5hrs/day and 5 days/wk is 17.5 hours/wk, 7.5hrs/wk less than the current schedule.
Now for the cool stuff!
17.5hrs/wk over 9 weeks is 157.5 hours total spent on the robot!
By actually saving more hours a week and allowing us to spread the time out further, we have actually prevented burn out, AND spent more time on the robot.
Morale of the story: By removing SBD, it does not require you to work your same schedule for longer weeks. It allows you to better manage your time spent on the robot, prevent burnout, and potentially create a better machine.
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Thank you.